A Not-So-Blue Planet
by xCaligula
Summary: An AU in which Jon Osterman dies, rather than becoming Dr. Manhattan. Chapters focus on Janey, Laurie, Eddie, Dan, Adrian, Rorschach, Hollis and Nelson, and Sally, showing how all of their lives are different.
1. the next day

Jon was dead and Janey was mourning, and everyone told her that that was okay, that that was natural. And she knew that it was, and that she was allowed to feel the way she did, but something in her told her not to.

It was the same something that had nagged at her from the beginning, before the beginning, even. Before she had even met Jon, back when the boys in school who were brave enough to approach the brilliant Janey Slater would flirt, and she would tell herself not to blush or giggle or give in to their advances. She was serious about her career, after all, and she was going to be so much more than the average woman. If she let romance get in the way, if she let a man into her life, it would compromise so much of that, and she didn't.

So, with all her dedication, she made it far, and she was respected in her field, not just as a woman but as a scientist. Things were better for her than they had been for the women before her, and she was blazing a trail for those who would come after. Her choice to avoid romance proved to pay off, but then she met Jon and all of that changed so quickly she barely noticed.

At first, he was just somebody new and interesting, and if she noticed that he was handsome, she didn't let herself think that for long. He was someone to talk to, just another coworker who understood what she had to talk about. Sometimes he was someone to buy a drink for, just because she could, and he was someone who was not very good at hiding that he was attracted to her, but someone who never acted on it and always treated her like an equal.

She barely knew that she was falling in love with him, of course, or she might have done something to stop it a little sooner, but then they were in New Jersey, and then they were in bed, and then they were together and she did not look back. Perhaps she had been wrong, and it was not that she couldn't have any romance, but rather that she just had to wait for the right sort, the sort that could be trusted not to hinder her. The sort that she could make work with everything else.

And they did make things work, and rather well. Whatever they had didn't interfere with their work, and though they didn't make their relationship public, they didn't need to. Everyone had seen it coming for a while and no one had to ask why they suddenly spent just a little bit more time with each other.

But then Jon went back for her watch and Jon was killed, and her last memory of him was running away while he begged her not to leave. It wasn't her fault that she couldn't bear to watch; she hoped that he understood that in his last moments. She hoped that he hadn't died resenting her.

He was gone after that, and suddenly all the room she had made in her life for him was empty, and she had holes in her life for the very first time. Never before had her life been anything but full, but now Jon was gone and she had to fill in the gaps he had left behind.

So that was what mourning was for her, and she found her old doubts about love and romance resurfacing, saying 'I told you so' and urging her not to waste time being sad over him because she had never been out to fall in love in the first place. No use letting it hinder her now.

It all came together well, actually. She buried herself in work, because that was what the practical side of her had always done, that was what that part of her nagged her to do to prove that love had not changed her, and she buried herself in work because she needed something to make her life feel full again. And anything was better than the sympathetic look and the, "Oh, of _course_ , dear," she would get if she requested any more time off.

Life went on without Jon, whether she wanted it to or not- and there were times when she did not know which were true- and the months went by. Janey worked and then she worked harder, and she never stopped remembering him when her guard was down and she always caught herself starting to tell him something only to remember that he was not there anymore.

All she had left of him was one photograph and more memories than she could handle on her bad nights, but she always got up and drug herself to work the next day. Always, she drug herself to work the next day, even if she spent the night sobbing over Jon's picture, even if she did not sleep at all, even if she could not shake the hollow feeling all around her because he was not by her side.

Jon was dead, and that hurt, but that was not going to change any time soon. When it had been six months, and she had allowed that side of her that had warned her from the start to win out, she could almost make it through a week without thinking about him too much. She could almost feel a bit less empty, and a bit more like herself, before she had allowed him to change everything.

There would always come a day when she would remember him, and that same ache would take hold of her, and one of the holes he had left would start to show again, but she would just have to fill it the best she could. The healing process would never really end, and she knew that, but if she could just get up and go to work the next day, then she could carry on.

She was mourning, and part of her told her not to even though she knew it was okay, but that part of her helped her to not mourn longer than was needed. That part of her helped her find her way to cope and helped her find her way out of the holes that Jon had left in her life, the holes that had been much easier to fall into than fill. And then she found her way to fill them, and she carried on. She didn't let herself fall again.

Every day, she got up and went to work, and she would keep getting up and going to work every day, because if she could just make it through another day, then she knew she could make it through the next, and then the next.


	2. being a hero

Tonight was, according to her mother, one of the most important night's of Laurie's career. She didn't doubt that it was important, but she doubted that what she did could ever really be considered a career. Somehow, dressing up in a costume and fighting crime, all for no pay, didn't feel like the sort thing anyone would call a career.

But that was what Sally had done, and she insisted that Laurie follow in her footsteps. Of course, she seemed to forget that she had done it to further her modeling and acting career, and that Laurie had never done either of those things. In fact, Laurie hadn't really done much of anything besides training to be a hero, and she was sixteen years old.

Now, some of Sally's former teammates were forming a new vigilante team, and Laurie had been invited to participate. It was the first meeting of the Crimebusters, and the real beginning of her career as a costumed adventurer. Needless to say, Sally was a bit more excited than she was.

"Are you sure you don't want me to come in with you?" she asked.

"Mom, _please_ ," said Laurie, groaning. "I can handle this myself. I don't need you holding my hand!"

"Oh, Laurie, you know that's not what this is about," her mother replied, rolling her eyes. "It'd just be nice to get to see your Uncle Hollis and Uncle Nelson for a little bit. You know Nelly's _so_ excited about all of this."

"This is a meeting, not a Minutemen reunion," Laurie said. "We're not going in there together, or I'm not going."

Again, Sally rolled her eyes. "Okay, dear, okay. Always so dramatic! But we're going to stay after when I come to pick you up, in that case. I'm not just going to _not_ say hello to either of them."

"What _ever_ , can I please just go _in_ already?" She didn't actually want to go in at all, but anything was better than sitting out here while her mother got misty eyed over days gone by.

"Yes, yes, go on already." Sally waved her off, and she got out of the car, heading inside Nelson Gardner's mansion.

~X~

From what she heard, the idea had been entirely Nelson's. He had decided one day that he wanted to try to recreate the Minutemen with the newer generation, and had contacted Hollis Mason, the former Nite Owl, to inquire after how to contact his successor. Hollis had been enthusiastic about the idea- or maybe he had just known that Nelson would need a helping hand- and offered to help lead from the inside.

He wouldn't be returning as Nite Owl, but he would help with organization and strategy, and secretly Laurie knew that it was better if he were a part of it. She thought Nelson looked a little ridiculous, still trying to fight crime at his age, and was sure others thought the same, but people respected Hollis quite a bit. With him helping out, things were sure to turn out a lot better than if Nelson was all on his own.

Laurie entered the room, looking around at all in attendance. There was Nelson, in his Captain Metropolis costume that was starting to look a little snug, and Hollis in regular street clothes. There was who Laurie assumed with the new Nite Owl, in a costume just about as dweeby as Hollis' old one, and someone she assumed, based on what she was read in the papers, was Rorschach, who unsettled her quite a bit.

Finally, there was someone she had seen a lot of in the papers- Ozymandias. He was young, though she didn't know exactly how young, and incredibly good looking. She had always thought he was too damn pretty to risk getting his face beat up every day, but, then again, people probably thought that about her mother, and maybe they even thought that about her, even though she thought she barely resembled Sally.

Seeing him in person was a different matter entirely, and she hadn't expected him to be just as good looking as the pictures she had seen of him. All in all, he was the most interesting one there, and as the meeting commenced, it was hard to keep her eyes off of him. She hadn't interacted with many people growing up, considering her seriously her mother took training her, and she'd never even come close to having a boyfriend before or anything like that.

At some point during the meeting, he caught her looking and gave her a smile. She looked away quickly, face burning from the embarrassment of getting caught, but then she looked back to return his smile. The rest of the meeting passed without much event, just Hollis and Nelson explaining different strategies they might try. At the very end, they were encouraged to talk amongst themselves and get to know each other well so that they would be able to work better together.

After much internal debate, Laurie managed to work up the courage to approach Ozymandias, giving him a shy smile. "Hi," she said, because she couldn't think of anything else to say.

"Hello," he replied, friendly enough. There was no need for introductions when they already knew who each other were, but she couldn't think of anything else to talk to him about. Still, she didn't want the conversation to be over just yet. Unfortunately, all she could think of was small talk, but he seemed to have no problem following along with that. He really was a friendly guy, and she found that she liked him quite a bit.

They had not been talking for long when Sally had come in, announcing herself theatrically as always, still desperately clinging to the limelight she had lost. She gave Laurie a mortifying, knowing smile before walking over to Hollis and Nelson, and she continued to look over for the rest of the time Laurie talked with Ozymandias.

~X~

"That blondie sure was a cutie," said Sally as she and Laurie drove back home.

"He's alright, I guess," Laurie mumbled, blushing. She had seen the way her mom looked at the two of them, and she knew what was coming. This was so not something she wanted her mom to be involved in.

"You know, if you're interested in him, it might not be a bad thing," her mom continued, much to her horror. "I know that I've not let you date before, but you're getting older now, and if it were someone like him, I think I could trust the two of you together. And just think of what the papers would have to say about it!"

"Mom, that's crazy!" she protested, her face turning red. "I mean, I hardly know him, and you're already planning the wedding, just because you think it'll get me good publicity! You know, I bet he's older than me than he looks, and you're just encouraging me to date him, and that's so-"

"Please, Laurie, I thought we talked about you not needing to be so melodramatic." Sally gave an exasperated sigh. "Forgive me for trying to have a little fun talking with my daughter. We never have been able to talk about boys together before."

"Not my fault," she muttered, but either her mother didn't here her or she pretended not to.

~X~

Laurie had been raised with rather mixed views about men. On the one hand, her mother had never kept it a secret that she liked to flaunt what she had and that flaunting that had been useful to her in life. She taught Laurie how to walk and talk with confidence like she had, and told her just how to act to leave men wanting more. She was taught to embrace her sex appeal, but there had been another side to it.

Sally had always encouraged Laurie to tempt men from a distance, to make herself attractive but never make herself available, not even for a moment. She was not supposed to get near any boys, her age or otherwise, and she wasn't supposed to pursue romantic relationships. Her mother never outright said it, but she didn't have to; Laurie wasn't supposed to trust men.

She was sure most of that stemmed from her ex-husband; Larry had never been a nice man, for as long as Laurie could remember, and he had never been much of a father (which, she had her doubts about that anyway). When they had finally divorced, Laurie had been more relieved than anything, knowing that she wouldn't have to see him anymore, and it wouldn't surprise her if he was why her mother had so many issues with men.

Still, it didn't make sense why she would teach Laurie to follow in her footsteps and train to be a sex symbol, all while teaching her the dangers of getting too close to men- though what those dangers were, Laurie didn't know. Sally never would go into specifics about them.

Now, however, she was encouraging Laurie to pursue a man, and it was entirely for publicity, no matter what she may say. She thought they could be some sort of vigilante power couple, and Laurie knew there was no way it was a coincidence when Hollis began to pair them up exclusively for patrols.

~X~

She and Ozymandias got to know each other during those times- he revealed his name to be Adrian- but they never really had much to talk about. They didn't have much in common, but sometimes she would mention that she had liked animals growing up, and he always had a fun fact to share with her. She liked those conversations, and she still thought he was plenty attractive, but knowing that her mother was trying to force them together made it hard to really like him.

It was a shame, because he was handsome and friendly and the perfect man in every regard, but her heart wasn't in her pursuit of him. But she still kept up the pursuit, because it was what her mother told her to do, and she had always kept up with what her mother told her to do. She didn't really know how to do anything else.

~X~

Their relationship began suddenly and surprisingly, and the first time Adrian asked her on a date, she hadn't seen it coming. She had tried several tricks to catch his attention, and he had seemed completely oblivious to all of her womanly charms, to the point that she had begun to wonder if she really hadn't inherited anything from her mother besides her eyes after all.

But one day, he asked her to dinner, and she was quick to accept. Even knowing that everything between them had been forced by Sally, she was still eager. She had never been on a date before, and she thought it could be fun; she didn't really have any friends either, and she would have jumped at the chance to spend time with anyone.

Once they had gone on their first date, it continued, and then he asked her- actually _asked her_ \- to be his girlfriend, and she tried not to laugh at how old fashioned it was as she accepted. Her mother seemed more excited than she was, and soon enough, the papers got a hold of it, and it was just what Sally wanted: Ozymandias and Silk Spectre, the super hero power couple.

~X~

Their romantic relationship was not much different than their friendship had been. Laurie didn't really know what dating was like, having never done it before, but she thought that there should have been more to it than what they had. It wasn't bad, of course; he turned out to be an incredibly wealthy man, and their dates and the presents he gave her were extravagant, but she still didn't know what she was supposed to talk to him about, and his physical affection left some to be desired.

He waited precisely until the third date after she had agreed to be his girlfriend to kiss her, and from that point on would kiss her once at the end of each night, sweet and chaste, and that was it. Occasionally he would hold her hand, but he seemed entirely disinterested in putting the moves on her, and she supposed her mother would be glad of that, but she was a healthy young woman and she wanted more from him.

But he was all she had, and she didn't know how to break things off or if she even wanted to over such a thing, not when he was still the only real friend she had. She had not really gotten close to any of the other Crimebusters when she had been made to spend so much time with him.

Despite whatever differences they had, they stayed together for years, even when things began to grow rocky in the group. Nelson was not getting any younger and he couldn't keep up with them, despite insisting that he could, and Hollis grew frustrated trying to convince his friend not to do anything reckless. Dan grew more distant as he and Rorschach's partnership seemed to falter, and the latter soon stopped showing up to meetings at all. From what she heard about him in the news, he was acting more erratically and solving problems more violent, and she figured it was better that he was gone; he had always given her the creeps anyway.

But the big surprise came when Adrian told her that he planned to make his identity public and retire. He said that he couldn't see heroes being welcome in the world for much longer, and didn't want to over stay his welcome. Not only that, but he felt that he had new ways in which he could save the world, ways that involved his business and, someday, politics. Laurie wasn't sure how to react to his revelation and simply offered her support, but said that she would not be able to quit any time soon. Sally simply wouldn't have it, and Laurie didn't know what else she would do.

Realizing that was difficult. She had spent her entire life training for something she hated, and now that she was an adult, able to make her own decisions, she couldn't choose anything else. There was nothing else that she knew, and it was just like her relationship with Adrian; she had been shoved into it by her mother so early on that she couldn't find her way out.

~X~

Two years later, when the Keene Act was passed and it was made illegal to serve as a vigilante- all heroes had to be registered with the government, and as far as Laurie knew, there was only one like this. Some man who called himself the Comedian who had been a very temporary member of the Minutemen once upon a time that no one she knew liked, but no one had ever explained to her why.

Laurie had no plans to try to register with the government, and when she told Adrian of this, he replied that he had an idea for what she could do now. When she asked him what he had in mind, he replied with a marriage proposal, and she had to accept. Sally was overjoyed and took complete control over planning the wedding, and Laurie sat back and let her. She wouldn't have known how to plan a wedding anyway.

But as the date drew closer, Sally began to act just a little bit off in ways that were barely noticeable to Laurie. She seemed almost nervous around her daughter, and it was not until the night before the wedding, when they were on their way home from the rehearsal dinner, that she found out why.

"Is there anyone else?" asked Sally, completely out of the blue.

"Wha-? Mother, of course there isn't!" Laurie replied, stunned. "I don't see when I would have had time to meet anyone else!"

"I just wanted to ask. You know you can tell me these things." She sighed. "I just...do you love him?"

That question was not an easy one to answer, even though she knew it should be. Adrian had been a constant in her life for so long that she couldn't imagine a life without him, and he made every effort to create romance for her. They went on nice dates, he bought her presents, he followed all the rules of being a perfect boyfriend, but for all the romance he tried to create, she never felt any that was natural. She knew that if she were going to marry anyone, it was good that it was him, but love was another matter entirely.

"I do," she finally answered, knowing it was too late for her mother to believe her.

"You need to make sure you really do. I mean really, really love him, and not anyone else." There was a look of sadness in Sally's eyes that had not been present there since Laurie had been a child. "If you're not marrying for love, there's no point in marrying, and I don't want you to miss out with being with someone you really do love."

Where was all of this coming from? It was the most genuine and selfless thing she could remember hearing her mother say, but something about the way she said it made her think that she was thinking of her own experiences. Her marriage hadn't been a happy one, and now she was trying to make sure her daughter didn't go through the very same thing.

"Well," said Laurie at last, "it's kinda late to be thinking about that."

~X~

On their wedding night, they made love for the first time, and it was good, but he was much more distant than she had expected him to be, and she couldn't help but think that it was missing something.

~X~

Adrian kept his promise to go into politics, and in 1980, Richard Nixon lost his first presidential election since his defeat at the hands of Kennedy. In 1981, President Veidt was inaugurated, and he and his wife moved into the White House. Laurie was the First Lady now, and while her husband did his job communicating with whoever was in the Kremlin at the time, negotiating and trying to create a stable, peaceful alliance, she kept busy with her own projects.

She advocated heavily for animal rights, and several shelters were built in her name due to the donations her charities produced. She was a good First Lady and the people of the United States loved her. Sally was proud of her in her own way; she was not the daring, sexy superlady that she had tried to train her to be, but she was somebody important now, and that was all she had really wanted for her daughter.

Laurie knew that political marriages tended to become strained, but things did not change much for them once Adrian was in office. He was attentive when he could be, gave her his artificial romance, and remained a good friend and a distant lover. She supposed she must love him, at least a little bit, if only for the effort he put in, not only with her but with everything. He was doing good, and she was proud of him for that, and did whatever good she could do in her projects as First Lady.

It wasn't much, but for the first time in her life, she felt like a hero and found that she didn't dislike the feeling at all.


	3. comforts of war

His arrangement with Anh was one purely of convenience. He wasn't a romantic, hadn't been since he was a teenager and even then, using that word was a big stretch. She was just someone to fuck because the war was shit and the alcohol only did so much to take his mind off of it.

Everyone was finding willing Vietnamese women to sleep with- and some soldiers even found unwilling women, but he was quick to let them know he wouldn't tolerate that shit- and if little Johnny, some barely legal, scrawny kid from Milwaukee was getting laid, then there was no reason why an American hero like the Comedian shouldn't be. And Anh appreciated the fact that a hero took interest in her and the two of them had a lot of fun when he wasn't busy.

But fun didn't last, particularly not at war, and contraceptives were hard to come by and he had been raised Catholic besides, and he should have seen it coming long before it happened. He didn't bother thinking about it though- maybe it the stress of war was getting even to him- and then she was showing and he knew that the baby was his, because she adored him and never gave another man the time of day, not that any of them would have had the balls to try and steal the Comedian's girl.

Eddie Blake had been a father before, but he hadn't; Sally had seen to it that Laurie was never really his, and he never tried with anyone else. He wasn't a romantic anymore, and he could barely understand her, and now she was having his baby.

The worst part of it was that he didn't really have time to deal with it. He had a war to win, and Anh was just a side project even now that she was pregnant. The conflict was in full-swing and he barely had time to see her, much less do anything about the situation. Soon enough, she was big, and he was no closer to the easy victory that he had expected when Nixon had allowed him to come to Vietnam.

Anh was a good sport about, or at least, if she had a problem with him being away, she didn't know how to express that in English. She kept herself out of harm's way and mentioned the baby sometimes, but she did not nag him once after he promised that he would take good care of them after the war.

But the war did not end and he was given a few days leave when he heard that Anh had given birth, but it wasn't the first time he had missed out on the birth of his child, so that was not his top concern. When he arrived, he found Anh, holding a small bundle of what he assumed was the baby, but it was so swaddled that he could not see its face.

"Our daughter," said Anh, beaming at him as if this were the happiest moment of her life. And maybe it was, and maybe there was something to her joy. She handed the baby to him and he looked down at the tiny face and realized that he had another daughter.

This baby was nothing like Laurie, who had Sally's teal eyes and Eddie's thick brown hair- his new daughter looked so much like Anh that he could barely see himself in her at all. He was both overcome and disappointed, because he had a second chance at a family, daughter and all, but it was not the family that he used to want.

"What will we call her?" she asked, snapping him out of his thoughts. "I have ideas."

"Martha," he replied, barely giving it a thought. He might have had an aunt named Martha, and that would be his excuse, but he wasn't giving Anh the chance to give his daughter a name he couldn't pronounce.

She blinked at him, as if surprised that he had not given her a chance to share her feelings, but then smiled. "Martha," she repeated, trying it out in her heavy accent.

"Martha Francis Blake," he said, and his mother's name was Francis. She hated it so much that she always went by her middle name. He hadn't seen his mother in years, but using the first name she hated so much as his daughter's middle name felt almost fitting, somehow, like a joke neither she nor her mother would ever get.

~X~

He didn't get to see Martha or Anh much after that, but he made sure that they were taken care of while he was away. Eddie didn't know when he had decided completely to give this a shot, but he had. The situation was only getting worse, and he remembered the times he had spent with her as one of his few comforts. If he did not love her, that was alright; he was sure he could at least pretend to.

Martha grew so quickly that each time he saw her, it was like looking at a completely different baby. The only clue that she was his was her eyes, whose color they had not been able to determine when she was first born, but were not plainly the same gray-blue as his. Otherwise, she was the spitting image of Anh and when he got the chance to visit them, the baby was always reluctant to let him hold her, regarding him as a stranger every time. He missed her first steps and he missed her first word, but the latter wasn't in English so he likely wouldn't have been able to tell it had happened even if he had been there.

When the United States finally gave up on the war, when Eddie figured out that his efforts had meant nothing and that he was no longer the war hero that he once was, Martha was a toddler. She could speak full sentences, but her English was very weak and Eddie had an even harder time communicating with his daughter than he did with her mother. Still, Martha finally recognized him as her father and that was, he supposed, better than nothing.

There was a large part of him that considering stealing away and abandoning his pathetic family; he had no particular attachments to them, other than memories of fucking Anh and whatever blood he and Martha shared. He had spent hardly any time with them over the past couple years and Anh had nothing. She could not pursue him or fight for him to support the child and he could pretend that this whole mess had never happened.

But somehow, that part of him didn't win out and he brought the two of them back with him and married Anh once they were in New York. For better or for worse, they were his family now, because he could not bring himself to abandon one daughter when he had missed his chance with another. He knew nothing of being a father, but that was what he was now.

The papers grossly romanticized it, going on about how the Comedian had lost his heart to the beautiful and exotic Ann (no one bothered to correct the spelling error) and had kept her as a wife during the war even though they could not be wed (except they could have, he just never had had any plans to). Of course, passion had blossomed between them and from that came the sweet baby Martha, last name not giving in the papers. The heroic Comedian had no choice but to rescue them from Vietnam and bring them home to a peaceful life in the States.

It was hilarious, but he was having a harder time laughing at his own life these days. He wondered how those who knew him felt when they saw the ridiculous articles.

~X~

Having sex with Anh was not as good as he remembered. Maybe it was because she had had a child, maybe it was because it had been too long for both of them, or maybe it was because he was back in America and had the choice to be with women he could understand, women who were much more beautiful than his wife. Whatever the case, he didn't like it and she was tired enough from dealing with Martha all day that she did not mind that he stopped trying to initiate after a while.

Though he saw them more than he did when he was at war, he was still a busy man and his work still kept him from coming home a lot. Anh never knew when he began taking other lovers, and he stuck to prostitutes because he could afford it and because things were less complicated that way. The women he saw were pretty in the artificial way that really wasn't all that pretty at all, but he decided not to be picky and his wife did not suspect a thing, too stupid to really know the man she had married.

She tried to teach Martha English by watching childish TV programs with her because the little girl would have to go to school someday and her broken English would not do well there. Anh began to learn better English that way too and was always so proud of herself, always waiting for Eddie to show that he was proud of her too. Perhaps he would have been, once, but he was already used to not being able to understand his wife and daughter, already used to resenting them for making him feel left out of things.

He had always known that he did not love his wife, but each day that passed made brought more clarity to the situation and he began to realize that he hated her.

Sally Jupiter had been the only woman he had ever come close to loving, and it was his regret in not being able to raise their daughter that had lead him to accept Anh and Martha into his life, but it was not the same. His family could not replace the family that he had always wanted but had never been able to have. He had never really known Laurie and he had missed out on all of her childhood, but he loved her all the same. Often he wondered what was so wrong with him that he could not love Martha in that same way.

But she was still his daughter and Anh was still his wife, and he stuck by them even though he really did not want to. He had his escape in affairs and work, and when he came home, he did not have to feign interest for too long before Martha was put to bed and Anh gave up on him and went to sleep herself.

It was not until Nixon lost an election and the insufferable Adrian Veidt (the bastard who had done many things to piss off Eddie, first and foremost being the fact that he had married his true daughter) was brought into office and Eddie was forced into an early retirement that things really grew bad for his home. Without work, he had no excuse for how frequently he left and Anh could speak English clearly enough now to argue with him. Martha would hide in her room while the two of them fought and Eddie never bothered to deny the accusation of cheating.

The day that Anh requested a divorce was one of the happiest he had had in a while and he couldn't stifle a laugh when he signed the papers.


	4. costumed

"You know, if you never say anything to her, you don't know what her answer's gonna be," said Hollis.

"I don't...really know what you're talking about," replied Dan. A rather obvious lie, considering Hollis had just caught him watching the young Silk Spectre talking with Ozymandias across the room.

"Sure you don't," he said with a snort. "I've been around longer, remember? I can tell these sort of things. And it's pretty obvious that you wanna talk to her, but you've just been watching her for weeks now. What's the worst that could happen?"

"Do you want a list of things that could go wrong or just the absolute worst?" He shook his head. "It's nothing, anyway."

"Look, I'm gonna give you so practical advice," Hollis said. "You don't know until you try, and it's never as bad as you think it's gonna be. But waiting around until it's too late? Now _that_ is exactly as bad as you'd think. Trust me, I'd know."

"Not with a girl like her, you don't," he said, shaking his head again. "I mean, Silk Spectre, she's..." He trailed off, not quite sure how to articulate it.

"I know better than you'd think," he replied with a chuckle. "Just think about what I said. Talking to her isn't as hard as you'd think."

Dan wanted to ask Hollis, "If you want me to talk to her so much, how come you and Nelson never pair us up for patrols?" but he didn't. If he did, he was afraid of an answer concerning why she was paired up with Ozymandias so frequently, and he was afraid that he would actually get paired with her and would not know what to say. No matter what Hollis said, he knew that she was out of his league and he knew that he could mess up a lot by trying to talk to her.

~X~

If he wasn't paired up with Rorschach, who had been his partner before they had joined the Crimebusters, he was sometimes paired up with Nelson, or he was sent out on his own, because he was skilled enough and had his fair share of gadgets that could almost make up for not having a partner. Dan didn't mind going on his own, and the group was an odd number considering Hollis was technically retired, so someone would always have to take turns being the odd one out.

Hollis had trained him well before he retired, anyway. Dan hadn't set out to retire him, had only set out to get some advice and get to meet his hero, but Hollis confessed to him that he felt like he was getting too old for this and that a young successor might be a good idea. So he trained Dan and introduced Dan to the world of crime fighting and extended an invitation to him when he and Nelson agreed to form the Crimebusters. If anyone could handle themselves on the streets, it was him.

But the Twilight Lady was a bit more than most could handle. She was skilled and she was intelligent and she knew how to handle herself in more ways than one. There was no need for her to be a villain to run her operations, but she recognized the appeal of it, just as the original Silk Spectre had realized the appeal of being a hero all those years ago. She gave herself an air of dark mystery and of power, and she scared away competition and brought in all sorts of clients. As time went on, she began to embrace the villain side of her persona and would sometimes pull off elaborate schemes, just for the fun of it.

She had been the topic of discussion at many meetings, but no one had really made any headway in putting her away for good. The Twilight Lady was clever and she always managed to get away and to evade capture. She also always seemed to show herself whenever Dan was the one looking, and he wasn't sure if she flirted this much with the other men on his team, but no one had ever mentioned it and he wasn't sure how to bring something like that up.

He was pretty sure that she had never approached one of them on the streets, cornering them in an alley with no purpose other than to talk to them and toy with them, but that was another thing he wouldn't bring up, because then he would have to admit why he failed to capture her when she did that, and then he would have to admit that he had had no good reason; he simply hadn't tried. Whenever she cornered him like that, he found himself transfixed, and he would not have been able to fight her even if he had wanted to.

Tonight was one of those nights that she cornered him, and he once again cursed himself for not being able to do anything to her. He knew that it did not matter that she was a woman; there was nothing about her that was not fearsome and she needed to be stopped, but he couldn't help but think that the fact that she was a woman had a lot to do with his problem. Or maybe just the fact that he had never met a woman like her before; the new Silk Spectre tried to emulate her mother's reputation for embracing her sex appeal, but this went entirely beyond that.

The Twilight Lady did not just embrace her sex appeal, her entire identity was based around it; she reveled in it. The outfits she wore, the way she carried herself, the way she spoke, everything about her seemed to be for the express purpose of exhibiting that she knew that power that came from her looks. It was a power that always managed to bewitch Dan in a way that he had never been bewitched before.

"Look whose out and about again," she purred, placing a finger on his chest. He flinched, but did not move. "You really are a night owl, aren't you?" She laughed at her remark, trailing the finger over his chest, and he had to fight off a shiver. "Fitting name. Tell me, what's it gonna take to get a cutie like you to give me some business?"

"I..." He could feel himself blushing, not the first time she made him grateful for darkness covering that. "I would never allow myself to sink to those depths, ma'am," he finally managed.

The Twilight Lady let out a loud, theatrical laugh at that before clutching her chest even more theatrically. "Oh, you break this lady's heart. Do you really think it's that bad, doing what I do? Is being with a woman like me really considered sinking? I have a soft spot for cute boys like you, but don't kid yourself- I know I'm out of your league just as much as you have to know it."

His blush darkened, but this time because she was right, he did know it. "That's not..." Typically, getting into costume gave him confidence that he did not have in his ordinary life, but when she had him like this, he could not form proper sentences or find the words to say what he wanted to say.

"One of these days, you'll come around."

~X~

Long after he was home alone, the remark still made him shiver in anticipation of something he knew he shouldn't seek out. The temptation was great, but he knew better than that and besides, she wasn't the sort of woman he wanted. Laurie- and when he was alone, he allowed himself to think of her using her real name- was, and she was so different.

Everything from her appearance to her personality was completely different, and she was the one he wanted. Maybe she was out of his league too, but if he was going to shoot out of his league, it would at least be for someone like Laurie, and he began to wonder if he was doing the right thing, avoiding the situation like this. There might be something to what Hollis said, and if he kept waiting around, things wouldn't get any better for him.

He decided he was going to talk to her, and things wouldn't be so bad and he would be more confident about things and then somehow, she would find him charming, and there wouldn't be need to think about any other women. Getting up his nerve was difficult, but he felt ready to approach Laurie at the next Crimebusters meeting.

But when he arrived, he could tell by the way she was hanging off of Ozymandias that their relationship had moved beyond patrol partners and Hollis gave him a sympathetic clap on the shoulder as he passed him. Just as he had predicted, Dan had missed his chance, but he had only decided to give himself the chance recently. Before, he had been expecting to be disappointed, but it was just as he had decided he had nothing to lose that he had lost.

He didn't know why he had expected any differently. Silk Spectre was out of his league and never even noticed him. The more he thought about it, there had only been one woman who had noticed him much recently, and the next time the Twilight Lady approached him, he went with her.

"Do your worst," he said.

~X~

She didn't do her worst, not at first, anyway. She told him that he wouldn't be able to handle that right off the bat and accurately guessed that he had never been with another woman before. In fact, compared to some of the horror stories he had heard about her tastes, things were incredibly tame in the beginning, but he was ashamed to find himself wanting to go that far, as time went by.

She started by tying him up, but he graduated from that quickly enough, and soon they were doing things he had never even heard of and never expected himself to like, much less love. And through all of it, their masks never came off and it was never known to anyone but them that they were meeting up like that. She continued to evade the law and he pretended that he barely knew a thing about her.

His free time, his time not normally spent as Nite Owl, suddenly became his time with her and he didn't care about being in the costume so often. It made him feel more like himself and she always thought it was cute, anyway. He wasn't quite naive enough to think that they were falling in love, but if that were to happen in the future...well, no one knew her true identity. It wasn't impossible to think he could get her out of this life, if he tried, and make an honest woman out of her. He was at least naive enough to think that he could make it work.

But even as caught up in their fling as he was, he couldn't ignore her crimes. Being with him hadn't made her any less of a criminal, and the rest of his team still considered her a serious threat. If anyone noticed the way he got distant when she was brought up at meetings, they did not say anything, but he knew that something would have to change soon.

"Do you ever think about getting out of here?" he asked her one day, deciding that he had to be bold. He couldn't afford not to be.

"And why would I do a thing like that?" she replied.

"Because we can't carry on on opposite sides forever," he said. "If we're going to continue like this..."

She laughed at him then, and the sound was harsh. "If you think I have any intention of switching sides, you need to drop that fantasy fast. I like spending time with you. You're cute and you're eager and it's been fun building your confidence, but if you think I'm going to change just because I like you...don't."

He would have liked to be able to say that he pleaded with her further after that, that he forced her to see reason, or that he up and left her then, that he gave her an ultimatum, but he did neither. Instead, Dan only fell silent, and things went mostly back to normal between the two of them. He was getting damn good at hiding disappointment, and she didn't bring it up again, not even to mock him over it.

~X~

He couldn't ignore what she did anymore and he knew it. Once upon a time, he could pretend that it was okay, that he would get her to stop one day and that she was not doing any harm, but that wasn't the case. She was doing harm and she wouldn't stop and he was doing something wrong with her. No matter what she could do for him or how she made him feel like he was better than he had been before, she was a criminal and he was a hero. That wasn't something he could ignore anymore.

Over time, he had gotten better at reading her and figuring out when she had something big planned, when she was about to pull of some sort of heist, and was even good at predicting where she would strike and how she would strike. He came up with a believable story of how he had managed to investigate her and confided Hollis and Captain Metropolis of his suspicions.

Though he insisted that someone else take the case, they replied that he deserved to be the one to get credit for bringing her in, since his investigation had contributed so much, and though he was afraid of what might come out if he did it, he did it. And when he had her cornered, she gave him a sad smile but she didn't say a word about him. Throughout her entire trial, she didn't say anything to let on that they knew each other intimately and nothing about their affair ever came to light.

Her name was revealed to be Leslie, and he realized that he had been ready to put a lot on the line for a woman he didn't actually know. She was put away, and his secret was safe, and Silk Spectre and Ozymandias were still considered a vigilante power couple, while Dan was sent on more and more solo patrols because he was now believed to be more productive when he worked on his own.

That would have bothered him more, but even when he was paired up to patrol with Rorschach, the man had grown distant even by his standards. The two had been partners before all of this, and there had been a time when he had been just a little bit more open with Dan than others, but now Dan felt as though he was just the same to Rorschach as anyone else.

But, whether it was because he had nothing to distract him or because he felt the need to prove himself, he did become more productive and he brought in several big name criminals single-handedly. In his every day life, he became more and more reclusive, focusing all of his time on developing new gadgets, making improvements on his suit, doing whatever he could to be the best Nite Owl he could be because when he wasn't Nite Owl, he didn't feel like himself.

In a way, he was grateful when everything started to collapse and when the hero bubble really burst. He didn't know how to be Dan Dreiberg anymore, he didn't have a shred of confidence outside of his mask, but he didn't want to be that way. When the Keene Act was passed, he was more than willing to quit, even if Rorschach continued. Ozymandias had retired two years before, but he was never out of the picture, and everyone knew that the pretty girl on Adrian Veidt's arm was the Silk Spectre. The two of them were married not long after she retired.

Dan retired to a solitary life, but he had grown used to that over the years and he needed the time by himself to start to rebuild his real identity. There were times that he would sit in his basement, staring at the old costume, wondering how much harm it would do if he suited up just one last time, but he never did. When Adrian was elected president and Dan received his first phone call from the First Lady, he wondered what she would say if he confessed he had had feelings for her for years, but he never did. He hoped that he and Laurie could become friends this time.

Becoming Dan again was not easy and he did not know if he would ever fully go back to the man he was before or if he could fully shed the Nite Owl to become someone new, but as long as he was trying, he figured that had to count for something.


	5. publicity

If he were going to make any real change in the world, Adrian knew that he would have to look at things on a grander scale. For years, his work as Ozymandias was productive enough, but it was only one small step in the grand scheme of things, though when he first started out, he hadn't known what the end goal was. It was only after he began to realize that he couldn't achieve anything if he did not think bigger that he really knew what had to be done.

Becoming a politician was the only way he could actually change what happened in the world around him. The hero work was too small, his work in business was too small, but if he had real power, then he would have real influence. Then he could truly save the world. But his hero work and his work in business were not completely useless; both had given him a strong, positive image that, if united, could guarantee him a spot as one of America's favorite figures.

He had always managed to maintain a good image over the years. When he had begun getting paired with Silk Spectre for nearly every patrol in the Crimebusters, it wasn't hard for him to figure out that her mother was pulling the strings there, convincing Hollis and Captain Metropolis to put them together. Sally looked out for image herself, and her ideas weren't bad. If she was trying to push them together, she obviously thought a relationship between them would look good on her daughter, and he knew that it would look good on him too.

Two attractive super heroes, madly in love, fighting crime side by side? The public would eat it up, and Laurie wasn't just beautiful, she was daughter and successor to the most famous female super hero of all time. He didn't have much of a romantic interest in her, but he was willing to play along. She was nice enough and he didn't mind talking to her, and when he began to realize that he was going to have to go into politics, he thought she would be good for a political wife.

So Adrian continued to build up his image on both sides, waiting for the perfect chance to merge them and begin his political career. It wasn't hard to figure out the right time, when he knew that the super hero bubble would have to burst one of these days. He had to get out before that happened, but not so soon that people would actually miss him as Ozymandias. It had to look like he had made a good decision, that he had left gracefully and at the right time.

When he did eventually unmask himself, it went just as well as he anticipated and he merged his two identities seamlessly. The next presidential election would be when he made his political debut, because he knew that starting with anything less would be selling himself short. For now, he could continue to build up his image of someone who wanted only what was best for his country, so that when he announced his running, he would seem like the obvious choice.

The Keene Act was passed two years after his retirement, and the nation hated vigilantes more than ever before, but because he had gotten out on his own, at just the right time, he was somehow exempt from this hatred. In order to help Laurie find her place in the world after this, in order to preserve her image, and in order to keep up with the benefits of their relationship, he proposed to her.

It was no surprise that she accepted; she had nowhere else to go. Her entire life had been spent training to be a vigilante and now she couldn't do that. She confessed that she had never really liked it, but that did not mean she had experience with anything else, and there wasn't a career left for her. Marrying him was the best decision she could make, and she had to have some sort of fondness for him. He was incredibly good at reading people, but he had never been able to figure out if she knew how much of their relationship was for show or if she even cared.

They went through all the motions of a couple, however, and he provided for her and gave her whatever she needed. She stuck by his side when he announced that he was running and she was there to celebrate with him when he won by a landslide, his perfect First Lady. Laurie had her charities and activities that kept her busy and kept her looking good while he did his work.

First and foremost, he made sure that the Comedian was out of commission. The man had been the only hero legally allowed to practice, having practically been Richard Nixon's lapdog, but Adrian had never cared for him. In fact, he loathed the man, and he made sure that, when he was running things, that Edward Blake became just another retired hero. It was slightly personal, he knew, but he also knew that soon enough, the Comedian wouldn't have a purpose to serve either way. Better to get the man out of the way early on.

To say things improved when he was in office would be an understatement. He was so attractive and charming and smart that there was not a major power in the world who did not want to take his side. To not take his side felt stupid, and to be against him would be to make a fool of yourself. The world had been stuck in limbo for so long, everyone afraid of what their enemies could do, everyone afraid to move themselves, but he worked tirelessly to bring them together and remove need for that level of paranoia. Suddenly, peace did not seem like such an unattainable goal.

He had accomplished so much in his life and he was only just beginning, with his sights set on always reaching for the bigger and the better. Laurie was so adored by the public and they were so good at playing their parts that they were beloved as a couple and they were always told what a shame it was that they didn't have children. And the illusion was never shattered because Laurie had practice with this and Adrian would never be so self-indulgent as to allow himself the risk of being caught with a young man. His work would always come before pleasure; he was better than that.

Adrian Veidt was bringing about a better world for everyone, just as he had always known he would. He was more of a hero now than before, though he knew that he could not have made it this far without Ozymandias and there were days he wished he could bring that persona back. Truly, there had been no hero greater than him, and maybe someday, that would be something that he could do.

There were nights when he wondered how it had all come to him so easily. Most days he assured himself that it was only natural for someone like him to achieve greatness with little adversity, but even he was not completely beyond paranoia. Most heroes had at least one nemesis, but he had yet to encounter anyone who posed a serious threat to his world. He couldn't help but feel that there was something missing and that there should have been someone or something there to make it harder for him, something standing in the way.

Perhaps he was so great that he was even beyond following the conventions of a hero.


	6. picking up pieces

If anyone thought that the Keene Act would stop him, they needed to think again. It would take a lot more than words, a meaningless law to stop him from doing anything, much less something so important. Rorschach was doing the right thing, and a backwards senator who didn't know what the real world was like wasn't enough to convince him to stop.

Just because the law was passed, that didn't change anything. Just because there were people out there who agreed with it, that didn't change anything. Those people didn't know either, hadn't seen all he had seen. There were few who really understood and the fact that he was the only one of the group he had once belonged to not to quit only proved that.

His partnership with Nite Owl had once been a great thing, had been the closest he had come to companionship, but that had fallen apart because the other man did not understand things like he did. He had been foolish to think that people with such different experiences and views of the world could really be friends, and it was weakness that made him lonely when Nite Owl began spending less and less time patrolling with him and confiding in him when they were a part of the Crimebusters together.

Joining the group was supposed to help the two of them get more done, have more resources, but soon they were being assigned different patrol shifts and not long after that, Daniel did not seek him out as often until it felt like their partnership had been completely forgotten. Whatever the cause of the distance was remained a mystery, but Rorschach did not bother asking and did not bother trying to find out. There were more important things to worry about than one man.

And then came that case, that final case that cemented everything. The day his old self died to be replaced by someone new, someone better, someone who knew more than anyone what had to be done. He never would have been able to share that transformation with anyone, so it was for the better that he was already alone. People noticed the change in him but he did not care what they thought or what they said.

When the Keene Act was passed, there was never a question of whether or not he would listen to it. He had hoped that at least some of his comrades would feel the same way, but every last one of them gave it up. Only the Comedian, a man he had never met but always admired, remained, working in government service, but Rorschach could not do something like that.

As much as he admired the Comedian, there was a flaw in working with a government that would ban their work otherwise, and applying to be one of their agents was the last thing he wanted to do. Working on the streets, answering only to himself and what he knew needed to be done- these were the only methods that would work, and he knew every trick in the book. Evading capture was nothing.

The real blow came when Adrian Veidt was elected president. He had never been one of Rorschach's favorite people, but he had been good at what he did and it was a surprise when he retired from being Ozymandias. With him in office, there should have been changes and the Keene Act should have been repealed. If anyone in politics would understand, it should have been him.

Instead, things only got worse under him. He went public, saying that he didn't agree with a law banning masked adventurers while one was kept in government employee, and that there would no longer be any need for that. The Comedian was retired and the statement given in the papers, about how pleased he was to have some time for himself and how he realized now how foolish it had all been, sounded so little like him that Rorschach was sure it had been fabricated. Wherever the man was now, it was doubtful that he was happy about his situation, but he did not continue operating on his own, and some of Rorschach's admiration for him dwindled.

Was there really no one in the world who shared his convictions? Was he always meant to be alone in everything? He knew that it was a small price to pay for what he was accomplishing, but he was still so weak sometimes that he felt lonely. That weakness was pushed aside as often as he could manage.

They had all been next to worthless for the cause. Ozymandias had proved himself as such with retirement, and even more so with his poor presidential decisions. Always clinging to his arm, the Silk Spectre was no better and had never been interested in the right thing. Just like her mother before her, it was all about appearance. Hollis Mason had already quit, and his successor had abandoned Rorschach for reasons unknown. Captain Metropolis was not so bad, having kept going even after people said he'd be better off retired, but everyone knew the rumors about his character.

Now the Comedian had been retired and had not fought it publicly, and had abandoned the practice altogether. If even he could give up so easily, what hope could Rorschach have for anyone? The world was moving toward peace, so the news reports said, but his city felt far from peaceful. While Adrian concerned himself with foreign affairs, his own home was falling apart piece by piece, and nobody else seemed to notice.

If the world was becoming a better place, as so many claimed it was, then he had yet to see that and doubted this "better place" was a place he wanted to live in. They had no reason to be proud of their better place, anyway, when there were so few actually working to improve. It was all so pathetic, but he supposed that that laziness was a part of human nature that many never overcame, and those who did almost always succumbed to it again.

But he had fought the urges to succumb to it until they had disappeared entirely, and he would not be one of the ones that fell. He would be the only one left picking up the pieces of the world, but that was a job that he had accepted long ago and it was a job he would never walk out on.


	7. aging

Hollis had been happy to retire, especially knowing that there was someone like Dan to take over for him, but he always kept in touch with anyone from the old group. It had been fun while it lasted, and he had fond memories, and maybe if he hadn't had to age, he might have kept going a little longer. But it had been time for him to retire, even if some of his old companions didn't feel the same way.

Nelson was still active, and they still spoke regularly, and Hollis never mentioned that he thought it somewhat ridiculous that he was still trying to keep it up. And he didn't even say how ridiculous he thought Nelson's suggestion was when he called one afternoon, though he did think the idea was good, even if he thought the idea of Nelson taking charge of such a thing was a bit too much.

Nelson wanted to start a new group, like the Minutemen had been. Since Dan had taken to the streets as Nite Owl, he had begun partnering with a new vigilante called Rorschach, and before that both Hollis and Nelson had met Ozymandias. Sally Jupiter's daughter had finally taken on the Silk Spectre identity, and with Nelson still active, he thought they had enough people to form a new group.

It wasn't a bad idea, to bring them all together like that, but Nelson was getting older and he'd be so out of place amongst those children. Still, he seemed to think that he would fit right in and that he was fit to lead them, though he hoped that Hollis would help him out in this.

"You don't have to get back in costume," he said. "But you know just about as much about this as I do, and it would be nice to have someone with my level of experience helping from the inside."

Hollis agreed to join in the effort, because he thought it would be fun to be a part of things without really being a part of things, but still he secretly wished that Nelly would realize that he couldn't keep this up forever. Whatever the case, he extended an invitation to the first meeting of what Nelly wanted to call the Crimebusters (and it was very hard not to laugh at the name) to Dan, who passed it along to Rorschach. A call was made to Sally and Nelson tracked down Ozymandias to tell him about it as well.

The first meeting was, overall, a success. Everyone seemed optimistic, and if some of them shared the opinion that Nelly looked a little silly, Hollis got enough compliments for how he helped conduct the meeting and was told enough times that it was good to have him there, that he was sure things would turn out just fine. It was odd to see Laurie, all grown up and in a costume of her own when he had always only seen her as Sally's little girl.

Even still, that image was there. Her costume was different, but it was the same yellow and black, and she was just as beautiful as her mother, though the resemblance between them was minimum, with just their eyes and a few facial features in common. He supposed Laurie had taken after Larry more, but he couldn't really see what she had in common with him either.

But he could see the way she looked at Ozymandias, and though Hollis hadn't even come close to raising her, not even after the divorce, he felt just a little bit protective of her and wondered, should she try to pursue this, if he would be the best choice for her. The young man was very bright and strong and talented, so perhaps he would be, but when Hollis caught Dan staring, he found that he had a bias as far as who Laurie should date was concerned.

When the meeting began to wind down, he saw Laurie and Ozymandias talking, while Dan was trying to gauge Rorschach's reaction to their new group. Hollis watched the kids, feeling proud and hopeful and even a little bit excited. Nelly came to stand beside him, looking absolutely overjoyed.

"I didn't know it would go over this well!" he said, grinning. "I thought it might take more time to build up trust, but I think everyone is pretty much all in."

"Well, that's good," replied Hollis. "I think this will be a good thing for everyone."

"Thank you for helping me. I know I owe at least half my success to you."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that," he said, shaking his head and chuckling.  
"Well, I would," Nelly replied. "People really respect you, and even if you aren't in costume anymore, you make a great addition."

Hollis would have continued his modest act and continued brushing of Nelson's compliments, but Sally strolled in then, throwing her arms around the two of them and saying that it was high time they all got caught up. And, just like always, Hollis found that Sally had a way of distracting him from anything.

~X~

Sally kept in close contact after that, always eager to hear what her daughter was up to and always eager to offer her own input. In particular, she wanted to know about Laurie's budding friendship with Ozymandias and how they could help speed that along.

"The fact is, she has a huge crush on him," she said. "She won't admit it to me, but it's obvious, and I certainly approve. If anyone would make a cute couple, it'd be them, but I'm afraid she's not so good at dating."

It was painfully obvious that she had her own reasons for supporting the potential couple, but Hollis played dumb. "She isn't?"

"Of course not, silly! She's been too focused on training to worry about boys before, so I'm sure she's terribly clueless." She gave him that smile that always made his chest ache and laid a hand on his arm. "I was wondering if you and Nelly could help her out a little bit. Maybe...pair them up more often?"

He remembered Dan and how he always caught the young man staring, and he hesitated to answer her. It was all too familiar, Nite Owl mooning over Silk Spectre but too afraid to do anything about it until it was too late. He didn't want Dan to make the same mistakes he had, but he didn't want to say no to Sally and he wanted to make Laurie happy as well. In the end, he couldn't _make_ Dan talk to Laurie and pairing her with Ozymandias for patrols wouldn't stop him from making his own move.

"Alright," he said at last. "I'll talk to Nelly about it and see what we can do."

"Thank you so much, Hollis," she replied with a grin. "I knew I could count on you."

~X~

He did try to advise Dan after that, suggesting that he not let his chance pass him by, but Dan seemed convinced that he didn't have that chance and there wasn't much else Hollis could do for him.

"Kids, huh?" asked Nelson one day, after a meeting. "Seems like things aren't much different from when we were young."

"But we aren't young," Hollis said, feeling strangely irritated. He knew that his irritation wasn't directed at Nelly, but still, he found himself just a little bit less tolerant of the other man's games. "It's just that only one of us realizes that."

"What are you talking about?" he asked, already sounding hurt. Nelly always had been too sensitive for his own good.

"We're both too damn old to keep playing dress up and you know it," said Hollis. "I figured it out, so I don't know why you keep acting like you're still twenty-five."

"It's not like that," he cried. "It isn't something you get to old for, and...and the costume could be for anyone! But I'm trying to do something good with my life and that has nothing to do with my age."

"I'm doing plenty from the sidelines, without making a fool of myself," Hollis argued, not knowing why he was getting so fired up. "You could be doing the same thing and still do the same amount of good."

Now Nelly looked close to tears, but instead of giving into them, he steeled himself and said, "Just because I'm not content to sit back and let everyone else do all the work doesn't give you the right to criticize me." He turned and stormed out of the room, not turning around even when Hollis tried to stop him.

"Hey, I didn't mean..." It was too late, though, and Nelson was gone. Hollis sighed, knowing he had gone a bit too far. It had been out of line for him to say that, even if it was how he felt.

~X~

Dan grew more distant over time, and Hollis didn't know what was going on with the young man. He preferred more and more often to patrol by himself, and his former partner was more often sent out with Nelson. If it had anything to do with Laurie, he wouldn't be surprised; she and Ozymandias had made their relationship official. Dan likely just needed some time to himself.

Otherwise, the team was still running smoothly, doing better than the Minutemen ever had. Rorschach was the only one with a particularly abrasive personality, but he kept mostly to himself and didn't cause trouble, while Laurie and Ozymandias had become a perfect team. Dan and Nelly could get along with anybody, even with Dan growing distant and Nelly still hurt from his argument with Hollis.

The argument went unmentioned between them and they tried to carry on like it hadn't happened, but things were tense and they didn't talk as much as usual. Until one night, when Nelly staggered in from patrol, exhausted and bleeding. He was hurt pretty badly and Hollis ran to him to try and help him.

"It's fine, I can stand on my own," he said. "I walked back here, didn't I?"

"Do you need to go to a hospital?" Hollis asked.

"No, I'm fine. I just need to sleep it off," Nelly replied. "I just ran into a bigger group than I expected, it wasn't as easy to pick them off by myself." Hollis had had Rorschach go with Dan that night, hoping he could help bring Dan back to the group a little bit.

"Damn it, Nelson, this is exactly what I was talking about," he said with a groan. "You don't need to be putting yourself in danger like this."

"But I have to," replied Nelly. "You know I have to. If I could have stopped at any time, maybe I would have. Maybe when the Minutemen disbanded, I would have taken the hint, or maybe I would have retired with you, but I can't just stop doing this. I'm going to do as much good as I can in my life, and this is the way I'm going to do it. I don't know why it has to be this way, it just does."

"I just don't like to see you hurt," he said, sighing. "I'm sorry about the things I said before, I just worry about you."

The other man laughed lightly and said, "You don't need to worry about me, Hollis. You know I can handle a little pain." An awkward silence followed, both of them reminded of something long over. "Anyway...I'm not going to stop, and I don't want our friendship to be compromised. Even if you don't understand why I won't stop, I'd like it if you'd accept it."

Hollis nodded. "Alright. Even if I think you're damn near crazy for this, I'm still with you."

"And I'm sorry for insulting you before. You do a lot of work to help us and your strategies have been very useful. I know I couldn't do this without you, and I didn't mean a word of what I meant before."

The two had mended their fences, and though Hollis still wasn't sure if he approved of Nelly's decisions, he wouldn't question them anymore. He felt a little bit sorry for him and whatever drove him to think that this was the only way he could do good, but he also admired him for never giving up and sticking to his convictions like that. Nelson was a good men and one of the best friends anyone could ask for, and if it weren't for him, Hollis wasn't sure if he'd be able to see just how worth it all of this was.


	8. mother knows best

The divorce didn't bother Sally much. She hadn't loved the man even when she married him, and staying with him for so long had just been a good cover for Laurie, when she had been too ashamed and afraid to address the subject of her true father. And perhaps she would always be that ashamed and that afraid, but it didn't matter a bit now. The girl was about to turn eight, and she had everyone fooled.

Now, there was no one standing in her way when it came to her plans for the little girl. Maybe she had missed her chance at stardom, but that didn't mean Laurie would. She would pick up where Sally had left off, she would achieve what Sally couldn't, and Sally wouldn't even be jealous, because she would know Laurie wouldn't have been able to get there without her, and what sort of mother got jealous of her own daughter anyway?

Laurie would be the better Silk Spectre, in some regards, but it really wasn't a competition.

~X~

There were days when Laurie complained about her exercise routines or the fact that she had to train so much or that Sally kept her in homeschooling every year, but she was growing up. All teenage girls tried to rebel; Sally certainly remembered how she had been and how she had taken charge of her own life at that age, but it was different for her and she had made the right decision. She was still making the right decision now, and Laurie would thank her for it someday.

So she didn't let her little signs of rebellion deter her, and she kept her daughter training towards the day when she would finally be able to debut, when she would finally be ready to take on the streets of New York and earn fame for herself. That was why, when Laurie was sixteen, Sally was so excited to hear about the Crimebusters. The Minutemen had helped her get more visibility back then, so this was her daughter's perfect chance to get noticed and to be a part of something special.

Laurie insisted that Sally not come into the meeting with her, already trying to act so tough and grown up. It was enough to bring tears to Sally's eyes, not that she would ever let Laurie see them. Instead, she replied that she'd come in when it was time to pick her up because she wanted to talk to Hollis and Nelson.

She wondered what it would be like in there, with so many heroes together. Would it be anything like the old days? Hollis wasn't in costume anymore, but there was a new Nite Owl taking up the cause, and Sally had sent in the new Silk Spectre. Nelson was still calling himself Captain Metropolis, and there was that cutie from the papers, that Ozymandias. There was another one that she couldn't remember, who worked with Nite Owl and who Hollis had said would probably be there. She didn't ask him if he had plans of asking the Comedian, because she was sure that he didn't.

Not that she had any interest in seeing him after all these years. In fact, it was better that Eddie wasn't there, getting too close to Laurie. He had stopped pushing to be a part of her life before she was even born, at Sally's insistence, but how would he act around her in person? She was sixteen, the same age he had been when he got his start, so she was practically an adult to him, and with Larry out of the picture, the two of them had nothing to be afraid of. For all she knew, he would have tried to get close to her and try to spill the beans. It was much better that he wouldn't be there.

And when she sauntered in later that evening, she was glad that she didn't have to worry about what would happen if he tried to talk to her in front of their old friends. She had never revealed the nature of their relationship to anyone but Larry, and she hadn't had much of a choice in that one. But then Eddie was pushed from her mind when she saw Laurie talking with Ozymandias, and she could read the expression on her daughter's face quite clearly.

So Laurie had her eye on the popular, handsome hero. Sally had always tried to keep Laurie's mind off dating, not wanting anything to distract her from her career and knowing well and good what that sort of distraction could lead to. She could only protect Laurie so much, but here, she didn't feel like there was anything to protect her from. He seemed, from what she could tell, to be a decent young man, and he was very famous; being seen on his arm could do wonders for her.

She tried to get some information out of Laurie on the way home, but her daughter was immediately put off by it. "I hardly know him, and you're already planning the wedding, just because you think it'll get me good publicity! You know, I bet he's older than me than he looks, and you're just encouraging me to date him, and that's so-"

"Please, Laurie," she said with an exasperated sigh, "I thought we talked about you not needing to be so melodramatic. Forgive me for trying to have a little fun talking with my daughter. We never have been able to talk about boys together before."

"Not my fault," Laurie replied, and that stung. The kid had no idea what she was talking about, did not understand a damn thing, and it wasn't her place to say something like that. For the rest of the trip home, Sally did not bother trying to talk to her daughter any further.

~X~

Even if Laurie didn't appreciate her, Sally wouldn't stop doing what she could to help her out, and that was why she kept in such close contact with Hollis. He kept her filled in on what Laurie was up to and it was through these discussions that she was able to gauge just how close Laurie and this Ozymandias fellow were. And that was why she decided to ask a favor of her old friend, who she knew could never resist her.

"I need you to help me out," she said. "But really, you'll be helping Laurie."

"What do you mean?"

"The fact is, she has a huge crush on him," she replied. "She won't admit it to me, but it's obvious, and I certainly approve. If anyone would make a cute couple, it'd be them, but I'm afraid she's not so good at dating."

"She isn't?" he asked, and Sally could have laughed at how innocent the poor man was.

"Of course not, silly! She's been too focused on training to worry about boys before, so I'm sure she's terribly clueless," she said with a grin, knowing how he melted under her smile. Now, it was time for the purpose of their conversation, and she rested a hand on his arm for good measure. "I was wondering if you and Nelly could help her out a little bit. Maybe...pair them up more often?"

~X~

From that point on that, she left things in their hands. She knew that eventually the young man wouldn't be able to resist her daughter, and then it wouldn't matter if Laurie didn't know how to date or not; things would take off between them without any trouble, because mother always knows best.

When he finally got around to asking Laurie out, Sally was sure she only told her because she had to let her know why she would be out that night, and from that point on, told her only the bare minimum. But there was a second date, and a third one, and the press caught wind of it- a few tips here or there helped speed that along- and the new power couple had taken off. She wondered if Ozymandias (and Laurie did at least tell her that his name was Adrian) had any interest in performing himself. If they could be sold as a duo, Laurie would be able to move from hero to star in no time.

It was best not to try to rush things, however, and with the hero thing working out so well and with Laurie growing more and more distant, she laid off on pushing her for the time being. The time would come when she would appreciate it all, and then they could make some real progress in getting her into show business once and for all.

~X~

But that time never came, and Laurie shut her down any time she tried to bring up her career. "Haven't you forced me into enough?" she'd say. "Can't you give me some time to handle everything you've already put on my plate?"

Time was running out for her and her chance at stardom, but she didn't seem to care and all Sally could do was try to be involved in whatever way she could. Even Hollis did not have any suggestions for how to reach her daughter and would instead reply that it might be a good idea to let Laurie do her own thing. _But Laurie doesn't know_ how _to do her own thing!_ She would think, and she wanted to scream because she was the only one who knew how to handle this and she was watching all of her dreams fall apart all over again.

The years went by faster than she could count, and she was getting so much older now and so was Laurie, and if she wasn't careful, life would end up passing her by before she'd accomplished anything. And then two things happened around the same time that shook Sally up in very different ways.

Adrian's retirement was the one that should have affected her the most, being so close to her and all. He was practically her son-in-law, and he had decided to focus on business for the time being, confessing a secret interest in pursuing a political career. Gone were his days as Ozymandias, and gone was chance to market him and Laurie as a super hero duo, but all was not lost. He was a wealthy businessman, very much in the public eye, and politics would be even better. Sally could recover this.

But when the Vietnam War ended, there was news that should not have affected her nearly as much as it did. It was far away from her, it did not concern her, it was not a part of her life, but when she saw it in the papers, it hit her like a freight train. The Comedian had gotten married.

The article waxed poetic on the Vietnamese woman he had allegedly fallen in love with and rescued from a war torn country, some bitch named Ann, and Sally snorted, unable to imagine Eddie doing any of the things the article claimed he had. They claimed he lived with her as a wife long before he brought her back to America, claimed he had been madly in love with her and all this flowery, romantic bullshit that seemed so far-fetched, even more so when she reached the part about the baby.

So, he had knocked her up during the war, and married her out of guilt or obligation or both, and all of this was bullshit. It had to be, because Sally knew damn well that _she_ was the only one he had ever tried to marry and her daughter was the only one he really wanted to raise, and there was just no way that someone like him could show that much sincerity to anyone else. What they had had been special and he wasn't capable of feeling that way about anyone but her. She knew it.

But she had rejected him anyway, because she had bigger plans and a broken marriage and an exposed affair would risk them, and it wasn't worth it to accept an offer of marriage from him, even if she knew that the fact that he was even offering meant something big. She had thought it was a novelty thing. Eddie wouldn't ever find anyone else, so even if she couldn't have him, he could not replace her.

But along came an article claiming that he had, and she was more angry than she had ever been at him, even more angry than the first day he had come to her, acting as if he had any right to show up at her home unannounced. How dare he replace her? How dare he replace her and then replace her daughter with a new daughter? This Martha, who would be nowhere near as beautiful as Laurie, she was sure, and there was no way Ann could have her beat.

How dare he marry someone else? She had rejected him, but he had accepted her rejection. How dare he move on and not try to fight for her? How dare he try to be happy with anyone else? Why was she only just now starting to regret how things had ended for them?

~X~

Two years after Adrian retired, the Keene Act was passed and Laurie had to quit, and she was nowhere near a modeling job or a movie deal or anything like that, and she never had been. Sally had accomplished absolutely nothing for her, and now she didn't know what her daughter was going to do with her life. The only thing she had ever known had been taken from her, and she was a bit too old to start over now.

But then Laurie came to her and said that Adrian had proposed, and that gave Sally something to do. "This is the best news I've heard in a long time!" she declared. "You just sit back and let me handle things, sweetie. It'll be the best wedding you could ever imagine!"

It was a great distraction, and Adrian was willing to fund everything she wanted to do in order to make the wedding perfect, but the more time she spent planning their wedding, the more time she spent seeing them together, and the more she wondered about their relationship. They had been together for so long, but they were getting married now and didn't seem the least bit excited. Both of them carried on as if nothing were changing, as if the wedding didn't mean anything to them.

Even at the rehearsal dinner, there was nothing, and as she and Laurie drove home, she had to say something. "Is there anyone else?"

She was relieved by how shocked and appalled Laurie seemed by the question. "Wha-? Mother, of course there isn't! I don't see when I would have had time to meet anyone else!"

"I just wanted to ask. You know you can tell me these things." But even as she was saying it, Sally sighed, because she knew that Laurie had never confided anything in her and wouldn't start now. "I just...do you love him?"

The silence that followed gave Sally the only answer she needed, but Laurie still bothered to lie to her. "I do," she said at last.

"You need to make sure you really do. I mean really, really love him, and not anyone else," she said, not sure why she was saying this. It wasn't for Laurie, not really. "If you're not marrying for love, there's no point in marrying, and I don't want you to miss out with being with someone you really do love."

"Well, it's kinda late to be thinking about that," said Laurie, and she was right. It was too late, for both of them.


End file.
